giovedì 28 febbraio 2008

Confidence

What does it stand for? Well, for instance it deals with sudden situations you have to front knowing that you *can* successfully front them.
The first roll of film I shot with my father's Yashica FX-3 was a two-years-expired roll of Ilford FP4+ film, and it was easy because the FX-3 has a light meter. A light meter doesn't necessarily tell the truth, but it can safely approximate it and the vast latitude of the FP4+ film does the rest; you shoot and you get photographs. But starting from the second roll, I began shooting with the Zorki 4 rangefinder, and I hadn't a meter; I simply learnt the Sunny16 rule and started extimating how many stops the light was below than optimal. It's not, as some would think, a matter of memorizing a complex array of times and exposures, you just have to be able to tell how lower the light is than full. Esay enough. You know the starting point, all you need is a sense for dim: one stop below, two, three, oh, it's a heavy overcast, we might reach five-six stops below. Then you need practice for night shots, but it's a matter of a couple of rolls. To be honest, the first photograph I ever shot using this method (on Ilford film and my Zorki) was perfectly exposed; I had an instant confirmation by my Nikon 5700 just a minute after, but it's the neg which said it all, when I processed it and saw the result.
You develop a firm confidence in your sense for light, and a belief in the uselessness of a light meter; no, wait, "useless" is not the right term, I'd rather say "superfluous", that means it's a gadet you got but you can safely do without. Exactly. I don't care if I have to think before framing, it's ok to me, it's part of the process. And believe me as I started shooting digital, so I' not far from that vast group of photographers who rely on their huge digitally-automatized cameras and the neeed for an instant satisfaction: viewing the photograph ass soon as you shoot it.
I'm not saying it's no good; the result is what matters, indeed, and the process to get it doesn't add or subtract value to the photograph.
I just say it's not fun, to me. What's cool in pressing a button? Results can make you blind, man, if I liked to push buttons I could spend my afternoons turning on and off the lights...
And when you find yourself in front of a nice subject and you discover that the meter's batteries have just run out because you accidentally left it on - as I happened to experience a couple of days ago - you grab the camera, smile, take a look around and think: "...mmmhhh... it must be four stops below...", then quickly set the camera, frame and shoot.
It's not a concern; you got confidence.

venerdì 22 febbraio 2008

Tractors


Funny thing: I go out to shoot a building aside my workplace and though I expected not to find anyone, the site was crowded... Yes, I can't shoot masons and think that I won't be punched, so I had to go around it and shoot it from the beach. And the beach was being ripped by a tractor, which traced wonderful dotted lines on the sand. I still don't know why.
This is why I mainly shot the sand.
Oh, and I had to test an old Nikkor AF 70-210 zoom (which digitally turned out to be a powerful 105-315) on my collegue's D50. Yeah, that's overkill, and after all I don't like those bulky DSLR's, but sometimes we all feel somewhat hard-rock with a big gun in our hands...!

Copyright 2008 by Alessandro "RonJe" Melillo

Camera: Nikon D50
Film: digital 400 ISO equiv
Focal Length: 315mm (in 35mm equiv)
Aperture: f/5.6
Exp. time: 1/250
Filter: none

Location: San Vincenzo
Soundtrack: ---
Other: ---

giovedì 14 febbraio 2008

Skyscraper



Skyscraper, Follonica, February 2008
Follonica is a strange place. A small town with a lot of relatively small buildings and condos, narrow one way streets, a messy urban plan and a single unusually weird skyscraper one can clearly notice from the other end of the gulf, i.e. Piombino, my hometown. What's most weird is that you could imagine life around it, I mean shops, people, traffic; well, the truth is that the raw parking lot is almost empty, no shops around, no people, nothing. I decide for an extreme architectural perspective, it's - obviously - starting to rain and though I have a tiltable display pointing the lens upwards ain't the best thing to do. No worries, after all it's only cold and windy too, there isn't light but an iso 200 equiv might work. I need 1/8 s, hold it firmly, man, or you're gonna miss it. Click. Click. Click. Three shots, my lens is covered with tiny raindrops. One will be ok: the one above. Oh, and I was almost sure to find a fine on my car's windshield, which I luckily didn't.

Copyright 2008 by Alessandro "RonJe" Melillo

Camera: Nikon 5700
Film: digital 200 ISO equiv
Focal Length: 35mm (in 35mm equiv)
Aperture: f/2.8
Exp. time: 1/8
Filter: none

Location: Follonica
Soundtrack: ---
Other: ---

lunedì 4 febbraio 2008

Tagliate



Cava delle Tagliate, ditta Henraux, Alpi Apuane.
'Twas a nice stop. We were heading towards a two days hike and camp in Puntato, above Alpi Apuane, where every year in September many people meet to spend a weekend camping happily between the mountains.
The Tagliate quarry is on the way and represents a highly scenic location where a huge white marble block is cut vertically making a twenty foot tall and very narrow portal. then, the quarry is filled with angled stones sunk in the water, the most still water ever seen.
Geometry rules here, light is very low but - you guessed it - enough to shoot nice pictures at least until the hour is too late. You have a difficult task in composing a frame, and that's the hardest task among many: light, as said, stability, reaching a spot, focusing, catching reflections and transparency at the same time.
This shot seems, partly, the result of a double exposure though it isn't. Single shot, single frame.
Gotta go back there, by Vespa, better (did you take a look at my Vespa weblog?), and bring my medium format camera and a tripod.

Copyright 2008 by Alessandro "RonJe" Melillo

Camera: Nikon 5700
Film: digital 100 ISO equiv
Focal Length: 35mm (in 35mm equiv)
Aperture: f/2.8
Exp. time: 1/250
Filter: CPL

Location: Alpi Apuane - Cava delle Tagliate
Soundtrack: silence. everything is still there. occasional bikes passing by.
Other: I had to be there to shoot, not shoot because I found myself there...

venerdì 1 febbraio 2008

merenda (afternoon snack)




That is. You buy this cheesy camera, you get a roll of expired film and it's way too obvious that you gotta shoot whatever you might find, as you're anxiuos to see how this metal box performs.
Geez, it does perform well! The glass is clear and sharp, the barrel easy to handle, the whole camera is a feather in your hands.
This folk was eating a snack (pizza, nice snack indeed) and I was focusing a bit aside, as in the mess you can't be noticed too much. The distance was approximately less than 10 ft. and yo him pizza was evidently much more important than me. That's the shot. Nice focus, good bokeh, and the film after all wasn't too flat.
The negative has been re-shot with my 5700 and then inverted digitally. I'm curious at what results might I get if I digitized it with a decent scanner...
In the meantime, enjoy this street shot, and try it yourselves, street is pure fun!

Copyright 2008 by Alessandro "RonJe" Melillo

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Camera: Pentax MX - SMC M 50mm
Film: two-years-expired Kodak Elitechrome
Focal Length: 50mm
Aperture: f/4
Exp. time: 1/125
Filter: none

Location: Viareggio
Soundtrack: "Siam tutti coltellacci" - carnival song
Other: ---

Tool of the Trade

This is the new tool of the trade. Pentax MX. Expect soon some pictures, shooting with it is way too cool. It took more than ten days to come from UK, but I got it at half the price I could buy it in Lido di Camaiore, so why worry? I shot an entire roll of expired Kodak Elitechrome film with it in a couple of days, fun to use, fun to carry around. A *great* camera, believe me, and if you like to learn it's a very good tool to get: cheap and perfect. I read it's the smallest totally manual SLR camera ever; it's light, indeed, what could be more desirable? a Leica? Would you really feel at ease with a four thousands euros (camera + lens) hanging on your neck? I wouldn't.


Copyright 2008 by Alessandro "RonJe" Melillo

Camera: NIkon Coolpix 5700
Film: digital 100 ISO equiv
Focal Length: 30mm (in 35mm equiv)
Aperture: f/4
Exp. time: 1/4
Filter: none

Location: Piombino (Steel Town) - living room
Soundtrack: random blues
Other: ---